With these is the incense-burning apparatus which consists of incense box (hsiang ho), the vase to hold the tiny tongs and shovel used for the charcoal and incense, and the urn or burner (shao hsiang lu). The last appears in very varied shapes, of which the most usual is the tripod cauldron (ting) with upright ear-handles. Others take the purely fantastic form of figures of animals, birds and even human beings with open mouth or nostrils to emit the smoke. Tiny vases for a single flower are usually placed upon the writing table, the furniture of which is completed by seals (yin), which are commonly modelled after Han dynasty jades with handles in form of camels, tortoises, dragons, tigers, etc., and small boxes to contain the seal vermilion (yin sê ch’ih).
Other porcelain objects which combined use and ornament were plaques (pan) for screens and slabs for inlaying in pillows, beds, couches and verandah partitions; actual pillows of oblong or semicircular shape with concave surface, the inside hollow and capable of being filled with fragrant herbs; bowls, shaped like the Buddhist alms bowl, for holding black and white chess pieces, and the other requisites for chess (wei-ch’i) or gô.
With regard to the plaques, we learn that the Emperor Shun Chih gave an order in 1659 for oblong plaques 3 feet by 2½ feet and 3 inches in thickness, but these like the large fish bowls were beyond the powers of the potters at that time. Indeed Père d’Entrecolles tells us that in 1712, the date of his first letter,[491] the potters had much difficulty in executing the orders given by the European merchants for plaques for table tops, etc., and that the largest practicable size was only about a foot square. No advantage was obtained by giving them additional thickness to prevent the fatal warping in the kiln, and it was found better to make the two faces in separate slabs united by cross pieces. Bushell points out that these double plaques were frequently sawn apart and mounted in screens, etc., as separate panels. The complete plaque is usually decorated on one side with a figure subject and on the other with flowers.
We should mention also among miscellaneous objects the beautiful hanging lanterns of eggshell thinness or perforated in openwork patterns; the barrel-shaped garden seats; the curious hat stands, a sphere on top of a tall stem or a little box mounted on long curved legs, the top in either case being hollow and perforated to hold perfumes or ice or charcoal according to the season; boxes of all kinds; small personal ornaments such as hair-pins, ear-rings, girdle-clasps, rosary beads, thumb rings, fingernail covers, tubes for mandarin feathers, buttons and pendants; the little bottles or flasks originally intended for drugs but afterwards consecrated to snuff when the Spaniards or Portuguese had introduced the tobacco plant into China at the end of the sixteenth century; and finally the ornamental heads of opium pipes made chiefly in pottery.
For household use the T’ao shuo enumerates rice spoons, tea spoons (ch’a shih), sets of chop sticks, vessels for holding candle snuffs, wax pots, vinegar droppers, washing basins (tsao p’ên), pricket candle sticks (têng ting), pillows (chên), square and round, tubs (p’ên ang), jars (wêng) with small mouth, alms bowls (po) with globular body and contracted mouth, plates (tieh), and bowls (wan); and for tea and wine parties and dinner services, tea pots, wine vessels, bowls, and dishes of every sort.
Bowls (wan) are found in many sizes and shapes, the commonest being the small rice bowl; the shallower type was used for soup (t’ang wan). There are deep bowls with covers which might almost be described as jars, and there are tea bowls with covers used for infusing tea in the absence of a tea pot. In drinking from these it was usual to tilt the cover very slightly so as to leave only a narrow egress for the tea and to prevent the leaves accompanying it.
When a tea pot was used, the liquid was served in a tea cup (ch’a chung) of tall upright form without handle[492] or cover. The Chinese cup is not furnished with a saucer in European style, but there are straight-edged trays which serve a similar purpose, holding one or more cups, and the old tea bowls and wine cups used to be provided with a circular stand with hollow ring in which the base of the cup could be inserted. The tea pot itself does not seem to be older than the Ming dynasty, and before that time tea bowls only had been used, the vessels with spouts and handles being reserved for wine and other liquids.
A tiny bowl is the usual form of wine cup, but beside these there are goblets with deep bowl, and the shallow-bowled tazze with high stems, like the early Ming “stem cups.” For ceremonial purposes, the wedding cups and libation cups were shaped after bronze ritual vessels or rhinoceros horn cups; and wine cups for ordinary use sometimes take the ornamental form of a lotus leaf or a flower. The commonest form of wine ewer is the Persian type with pear-shaped body, long graceful handle and spout. Others take fanciful forms like that of a peach or aubergine fruit, a gourd or melon. The peach-shaped ewer with opening under the base is the original of our Cadogan tea pot, and we need be surprised at nothing in Chinese art when we find this same principle and practically the same form in a ewer of T’ang date in the Eumorfopoulos collection. The tall cylindrical ewers with body jointed like a bamboo, and the front shaped at the top like a tiara, are used for sweet syrups.
The Chinese dish is for the most part saucer-shaped. When over half a foot in diameter it is called p’an, the smaller dishes or platters being named tieh. There are large dishes for fragrant fruits to perfume the room, and lotus-leaf shaped dishes for sweetmeats and various small trays of fanciful form for the dinner table; and there are the “supper sets” consisting of a varying number of ornamental trays which can be used separately, or joined together to form a pattern suggesting a lotus or some other many-petalled flower.
In addition to the native Chinese forms there is a host of specialised objects made for export and designed in foreign taste; such as the deep bowls with pagoda covers for Siam; weights to hold down the corners of a mat for India, in form like a door knob mounted on a circular base; narghili bowls and ewers for Persia, besides the bottle-shaped pipes with mammiform mouthpieces, which sometimes take animal or bird forms such as those of the elephant or phœnix; round covered dishes for Turkey; and all the familiar objects to meet European requirements. The sets of five vases (three covered jars and two beakers) are a purely European garniture intended for the mantelpiece or the sideboard.